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Where has the time gone to?

Now it's not the exact two year anniversary on here for me as that fell on the 2nd of August but coincidentally enough my account was approved on my birthday so that makes it easy enough to remember. Only took two weeks to get approved at the time. Back in those days steemit.com was the only part of the blockchain that I could see but I still did the obligatory introduce yourself post.
https://steemit.com/intoducemyself/@niallon11/introduce-myself
A work of art really. Just reading through it and seeing who was online back then. It got 6 comments but unfortunately only @samstickkz seems to be currently active. A few of the other have posted in the past year but not recently. Everything was much simpler back then even though the whole system was a complete mystery to me at the time. Everything crypto was new and scary but I felt like I had found a home. Before this I had been doing some writing on other sites. Short stories, working towards a novel (still unfinished ), and other bits and pieces. I though that this place was great. Write what you love, get rewarded, have a supporting community around you and learn about a new way of doing things. **I still feel that way two years later.** ![0kfnkhsq4x.png](https://img.esteem.ws/0kfnkhsq4x.png) [source](https://cdn.pixabay.com/photo/2016/03/09/09/22/workplace-1245776_960_720.jpg)
Back then I didn't know anything about crypto so my full focus was on writing and creating content. I entered competitions and writing challenges which were a great way to keep posting and creating. I might need to try and get them started up again as I have dropped out a bit from what I loved to do. Too many things happening on the system.

What has changed?

Where to start on this one. After spending almost a year lost in the STEEM wilderness watching people fighting and flagging each other while driving away users. I can honestly say that we seem to be coming out the other side of it. Steemit.inc has new management and seem to be knocking out the updates and communication. @aggroed and @yabamatt have been killing it this year with @steemmonsters, @keychain and steem-engine. Look at all the tribes and communities that have sprung up in just a month. Attracting new users and even bringing back some of the old ones. There is massive potential here to onboard people directly to the tribes once we get a proper mechanism for instant accounts. @3speak are leading the way here and have a great way to let people join instantly. I hope to see something like this for all the tribes in the near future. We might have had some issues with the gambling dapps that bailed on the chain but there are a few still going strong. @nextcolony keeps ringing out the updates and even @drugwars is still going. There is a clear leader in the dapps section though with @steemmonsters showing every other chain how it should be done. Update after update. A clear and progressive vision with a growing userbase ad marketcap. They have just released guilds and added yet another dimension to the game.
![mq6lpxxx6i.png](https://img.esteem.ws/mq6lpxxx6i.png)
Look at how good it all is. STEEM is growing and even though the outside world might not see it yet. **We will be a force to be reckoned with in the blockchain world.**

What's next?

Honest answer. I don't know. Two years ago I couldn't have imagined what all of this would have grown into. I couldn't have imagined the journey to get here either. Some people are worried about the price but it doesn't bother me for a second. Not when I can see the big picture. For me this is just an incubation time for STEEM where things are getting built and ready for the future. We can see development all around us and improvements every week. Once this hardfork has passed we need to see a proper way to onboard users and improve their initial experience. Those need to be a part of the proposal system at the very beginning. Once we have those tools it will be possible to market the chain properly and bring it to more people. The regular people. More people and more developers to build the next wave of apps on the chain. A more polished wave of apps with instant sign up and better user experience. All of this is still new and the rate of development is actually really good for what was just an app to blog a couple of years ago. STEEM will get scarce in the future when steemit.inc stops selling and I would encourage everybody to power up as much as possible now while it's plentiful. I know that I am. Going forward you might only be able to get some through buying or trading SMT's against it. I think that there is about 120M on the open market which is nothing if you think about it. Now is the time to get ahead of the crowd and pick up even more STEEM. I don't know what the future holds but I do know that I am backing STEEM and want to be as powered up as possible for it. Who knows what we will be at in 5 years time but we have some great people here to push it and I'm willing to back them. **The future is bright if we all work together and push this project. It needs to be a team effort but if people can cut out the shit and negativity it would be a great help. Focus on what is going well and help where you can. It will help everybody in the long run.**
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